


Ready? Ready.

by taormina



Category: Take That (Band)
Genre: Dressing Rooms, Fluff, Friendship, Hugs, M/M, Touring, some shipping going on if you squint, the ot5 to end all otps
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-26 01:15:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3831733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taormina/pseuds/taormina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s the first night of the 2015 tour and everyone’s nervous.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ready? Ready.

They’d be lying if they said it was easy.

Sure, they could change who sang what on one or two songs and adjust their dance routines accordingly, but at the end of the day they could never change the fact they were now a three-piece band. Tonight, there would not only be one, but _two_ empty spaces on the stage. Two spaces where Robbie and Jason should be. Two spaces that Take That fans will be looking at for the entire 52-date run, hoping that they might be filled halfway through the show, hoping that everything will feel complete again.

It didn’t feel complete for the lads at all, though. Even now that they’d done numerous live performances and one or two half-hour gigs as a three, things still felt weird. Like the fans, they still half-expected Jay to show up and grab his guitar. They still thought Rob might visit them in their dressing rooms and crack a few jokes. However, these things never happened and probably never would; as much as the trio would like to pretend they were OK with it, they really weren’t.

Just minutes before they were about to go on stage, Gary, Mark, and Howard retreated to their shared dressing room for a last moment of peace and quiet before the madness in Glasgow kicked off. Understandably, none of them spoke; for a moment, all they could do in this sacred moment was to look at one another questionably, standing a few feet apart as though they were mentally reserving a spot for their missing colleagues.

Gary was the first to speak up. He sounded uncharacteristically worried. ‘This is weird, isn’t it, this? First three-piece tour.’ He pronounced the words as though he hadn’t really considered the magnitude of the concept before. _A three-piece tour._ Him, Mark and Howard.

_Jesus, what if they’d made a terrible mistake?_  

Mark looked as anxious as Gary felt. ‘D’you think they’ll like it? The people in the arena? Y’know, the fans and the press?’

Howard folded his arms. ‘They bloody better; I didn’t almost break me neck in rehearsals for shite reviews.’ He rubbed his neck and looked Gary up and down. ‘I’m still not sure about those shoes of yours though, Gary.’

Gary looked at himself in the full-size mirror next to him as though he’d only just noticed what he was wearing. ‘Marko picked them out for me.’

Howard scoffed. ‘Figures.’

Outside their dressing room, people were frantically moving about. Dancers in full make-up. Excited friends and family. Technicians making last-minute changes. Every sound and gesture indicated that something very, very big was about to happen, and the tension was getting more and more palpable by the second.  

Howard felt sick in his stomach.

There was a knock on the door – Mark was lost so deep in thought that he had a bit of a fright – and their trusted security guard James entered the room.

‘Three more minutes, guys,’ said James, holding up three fingers. He then left again, leaving the door ajar.

‘Right, OK.’ Mark said flatly. His heart was hammering in his throat.

Gary shuffled on the spot awkwardly.

None of them seemed to be in the mood to go anywhere, never mind going on stage. Admittedly they always got nervous before a gig, even if it was just a silly little TV performance, but this was something else: this was pure _dread_. Highly aware that they had massive shoes to fill and many expectations to meet, they’d been working on this tour for months, fine-tuning every little move and explosion of ticker tape deep into the early mornings. Ifone thing went wrong now, if _one_ thing felt out of place, then everything would have been for nothing.

They didn’t only have to top their previous live shows; they had to prove that they could do so without their two mates alongside them.

James suddenly reappeared. ‘Oh, and Rob and Jay have left messages on your phones. Thought you’d like to know.’ He handed Gary a silver Samsung smartphone, and he left the boys to ponder in private again.

James’s words had reignited a spark in the boys’ eyes. Just those two names – Rob and Jay – made everything so, so much better. Suddenly, it felt like the two of them were there with them, spurring them on. _Oh_ , _if only the others could see what they had up their sleeves_ , Mark thought. They’d absolutely _love_ it.

Rather nervously, Gary unlocked his phone and tapped on the little envelope-shaped box at the bottom of the screen. Mark and Howard moved closer so they could see what Gary was doing.

Gary’s heart skipped a beat when he spotted Rob’s message in a sea of unread texts from friends wishing him good luck, and outdated texts from desperate nobodies wishing he’d write them a hit song. Rob’s message wasn’t hard to spot, though; as usual, he seemed to have forgotten to turn caps lock off, bless.

‘This one’s Rob’s,’ said Gary, as though that wasn’t obvious already. He read Rob’s short message aloud as Howard and Mark read along:

_HI BOYS.. MISSING YOU LOTS.._  
HOPE THE TOUR GOES WELL..  
I’M GOING THREE TIMES X

 ‘Good ol’ Rob,’ said Gary when he had finished reading the text aloud. For the first time that day, he was smiling, and Mark and Howard looked visibly touched. They’d have to remember to ask Rob which dates he was planning on visiting so they could do something special for him.

Robbie’s message had marked a visible change in the lads’ moods. Now that they knew for sure that they had Rob’s support, going out there in the dark catacombs of the SSE Hydro didn’t seem so bad. He’d be there with them, mentally and spiritually, even though he was probably about to give a kick-arse performance himself somewhere else tonight.

‘What’s Jay wrote?’ said Howard. The sick feeling in his stomach had been replaced by butterflies.

‘Hang on,’ said Gary, who had trouble finding Jay’s text. A few seconds later: ‘Ah, ‘ere we go.’

Predictably, Jason’s message was much longer than Robbie’s, and all three decided to take it in turns to read it out loud. Let me paraphrase it for you.

In his touching text, Jason decided to use tonight’s historic occasion to reflect on that momentous day back in 2005, back when the band were about to announce they were heading back on tour. Just moments before the announcement, Jason felt so sick that he nearly passed out. Every part of his body was telling him that he was making a tremendous mistake. It’s like the mere idea of touring was a disease that his body was trying to get rid of. ‘Me? Going back into the spotlight?’ Jason wrote, ‘You’re having a laugh!’

Spurred on by his mates’ support and excitement, however, Jason decided to join them anyway. Jason wrote in his next paragraph that after that great first hurdle had been passed, touring suddenly became a joy. He no longer felt sick at the thought. He loved spinning on his head on stage like he did in the old days. He loved helping Mark fine-tune his crazy ideas. He loved finally being able to sing a solo song on tour, even if he sometimes forgot the words.

Most of all, though, he wrote in his penultimate paragraph, he loved being with his mates, and part of him would miss being on tour with them terribly.

‘However’, Jason added after he had wished the lads good luck, ‘I still think you need to stop wearing hats, though, Mark.’  

When they had all finished reading the text, Mark started to sniffle audibly. The previous nervous tension had disappeared completely, and was currently gradually being replaced by hope. It’s like they had momentarily forgotten how much they all loved Rob and Jay, and were now being hit by wave upon wave of mutual feelings of love and reminiscence; like when you see a film that you loved when you were young and suddenly remember exactly how fantastic you felt the first time you saw it.

That feeling was like a superpower.

‘Mark’s gotten a bit emotional,’ said Howard a little while later, even though Jay’s words had given him goosebumps. Jay had a way with words.

Mark blushed and wiped his nose. ‘Ah, no, it’s, er, you know, hay fever.’

‘Sure, mate.’ Gary, knowing full well that Mark didn’t have hay fever at all and that Robbie and Jason’s kind messages had simply touched a nerve, gently pulled Mark closer and hugged him. Mark smelled very nice, of expensive shampoo and brand new clothes. It felt extremely good, holding him in his arms like this.

Mark stopped sniffling and sighed contently.

Maybe they still had time to insert a segment in which they stop singing and dancing for a moment and just hug, right on stage. That’d be nice, that.

‘Don’t you get ill though, Marko; I’m not going to form a duo with _Howard_ over there tonight,’ Gary said. He then winked at Howard cheekily.

‘Bastard,’ Howard replied, but he was smiling. He embraced his two mates in a wonderful group hug.

Together, the three of them were stronger than steel, but with their two mates’ support they were _unstoppable_.

For the final time, James entered the dressing room. Predictably, the sight of the Take That boys hugging each other didn’t even surprise him. ‘If you don’t go upstairs now I’m getting Boyzone on the phone.’ He sauntered off again.

 ‘Ready?’ Gary asked his fellow band mates when they finally let go of each other. He gave Mark’s hand a gentle squeeze.  

Mark nodded. He looked a little bit more determined now, albeit slightly flushed. ‘Yeah. Yeah, I think I am, yeah.’

‘And me.’ Howard said.

At that, the three of them left their dressing room and headed into the wild and beautiful unknown, Gary still clutching his phone; perhaps they’d be able to pull this off after all.  
  
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End file.
